New Report Reveals Public Schools in the District Remain Highly Segregated

According to Mandy McLaren of the Washington Post a new report released by UCLA revealed that Public schools in the nation’s capital remain highly segregated. The Civil Rights Project at UCLA determined that 71 percent of black students in the D.C. public school system and the city’s charter sector attended schools in 2013 that had virtually no white peers. According to McLaren that is a steep drop from nearly 90 percent in 1992.

The report also finds that public D.C. campuses are enrolling almost exclusively students of color despite an influx of white families into the city in recent years.

“Washington now has possibilities that most cities simply don’t have, and what’s striking about it is that officials have tried everything else [other] than welcoming diversity into schools,” said Gary Orfield, a UCLA professor who co-authored the study with postdoctoral researcher Jongyeon Ee. Read the full report here.